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Museum curator, storyteller Brian Richards relishes dream job at historic Yankee Stadium
BRONX, N.Y. — Brian Richards didn’t become interested in baseball until he was 16 years old.
That’s shocking considering how much he loves the game and it’s captivating history.
Richards, the New York Yankees’ museum curator, turned an internship with the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum into his dream job.
Growing up in Hughesville, Pa. — just 15 miles from baseball-rich Williamsport — baseball was inevitably going to be in Richards’ future. His dad, a Baltimore Orioles fan, brought him to his first baseball game in 1999 as a teenager.
“I really fell in love with baseball history as I fell in love with baseball,” Richards said.
At Susquehanna University, Richards majored in history with a political science minor. After his junior year, he interned at a railroad museum in Lancaster County, Pa. That was his introduction to curatorial work. And he loved it.
“It was just so interesting telling stories, having pieces with those stories, so I knew then I wanted to go into museum work,” Richards said.
After earning his undergraduate degree, Richards went to graduate school at the Cooperstown Graduate Program in Cooperstown, N.Y., one of the premiere programs for museum studies in the country. And Cooperstown just happens to be home of the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum.
Between his two years with the graduate program, he interned at the Hall of Fame.
“I was very fortunate to be part of their Frank and Peggy Steele Internship Program,” Richards said. “I interned in the curatorial department, and it was the best summer of my life.”
The summer of 2007 was when legendary hitters Cal Ripken Jr. and Tony Gwynn were enshrined. Richards had the honor of carrying Ripken’s plaque into the Hall of Fame to be installed in its permanent resting spot on the wall. He actually screwed in one of the screw covers — a moment he still cherishes.
Richards started looking for jobs in 2008 when the economy was at a low stretch. John Odell, one of the Hall of Fame curators, was Richards’ primary mentor and told him it’s who you know and who knows you. That advice came to fruition.
New Yankee Stadium was under construction at that point and Yankees’ Chief Operating Officer Lonn Trost was looking for a curator for a new museum in the venue. He reached out to Hall of Fame curator Ted Spencer, who told Trost about his intern from last summer.
Spencer recommended Richards to the Yankees. Richards accepted the job and started in October 2008.
“I felt like wanting to learn how to fly a plane and being put in the pilot seat of Air Force One,” Richards said. “I was 25 years old, I had just moved to New York City four days earlier. I was nervous, sure, but I also felt that I could handle the job.”
Richards couldn’t believe he landed his dream job at such a young age.
“I never thought about working for a sports team, it just never crossed my mind,” Richards said. “I assumed like most curators I would start out at a small museum somewhere in the middle of nowhere for base salary and live off a loaf of bread and a jar of peanut butter for a couple years just to get my foot in the door. This is something that I had never, ever fathomed could happen. And I was truly living the dream. In so many ways, I still am.”
When Richards started, there were no artifacts on display and he didn’t have any avenues to acquire artifacts. He scrambled to make contacts with private collectors. The museum had to open when the stadium made its debut on April 2, 2009.
“The night before the stadium opened, we finished installing the last of our exhibits,” Richards said. “We did some finishing touches the morning of Opening Day, actually. I slept three hours that night, having overslept — I meant to sleep two hours.”
Now 14 years later, Richards is running a smooth operation. He’s tracked down some of the best Yankees memorabilia on the planet and has it on display. It’s an amazing collection.
Richards has built some solid, everlasting relationships with private collectors, authenticators, folks in the auction industry as well as everyday people who come to the museum. He’s proud of the connections and relationships he’s built over the years.
“If you’re asking someone to borrow their Babe Ruth bat or their Mickey Mantle uniform or something like that, there’s a great element of trust that goes along with that,” Richards said. “There are a lot of tough questions you have to answer, there’s a lot of accountability that’s on your hands to make sure that nothing happens. If something does happen, you have to answer for it. We’ve been very fortunate that nothing of that sort has happened.”
He loves to head into the office and speak with groups that are checking out the museum.
“I just love what I get to do,” Richards said. “I get to tell stories. I consider this job to be a perfect intersection of my talent and my training and my interests. How many people get to do that? Every day, I come in here and it’s a new challenge. Every day I come here it’s an opportunity to do something that I haven’t done before. It’s an opportunity to tell a story.”
During a week where the Yankees have a homestand, Richards is routinely logging 60 to 70 hours in the office. He usually works eight-hour days on Saturdays and Sundays in season, so by the time a regular business week starts on Monday, he’s already put in 16 hours.
Since Richards stays for most night games, that means long 12- to 13-hour days. He tries to sneak out of the stadium in the ninth inning to beat the traffic rush.
During the offseason, Richards works a more traditional 9-5 job.
He’s been trying to balance work life better with his home life. Married with a toddler, Richards is kept busy away from the stadium as well.
Now at 39, he is loving life at and away from the park. Working for the Yankees is a place Richards can’t foresee leaving.
“I can’t predict the future, but I can tell you I love what I’m doing and I have no plans to go anywhere else,” Richards said. “I can’t think of another job that I would derive as much joy and satisfaction and pleasure from as I do from this one.”
